Recovery costs suggest we no longer value thrift

5:33 PM,
Apr. 12, 2013

David Barker

Written by

David Barker
| Guest Opinion

Disasters like the flood of 2008 often bring out the best in people. The flood allowed Iowans to demonstrate virtues we are rightly known for, such as generosity and courage. Some decisions we have made while rebuilding in the years after the flood, however, show a failure to live up to a lesser, but still important virtue that was once quintessentially Iowan.

That virtue is thrift.

Deirdre McCloskey, who once taught at the University of Iowa, points out that thrift is admired for different reasons by environmentalists, economists and those who worry about the excesses of capitalism. ...